Early beginnings Spiegel was a member of the board of the
Green Youth of Rhineland-Palatinate from 1999 to 2002, including two years as board spokeswoman. She then served on the federal board of the Green Youth until 2004. In autumn 2005 she represented young people in Germany at the
United Nations General Assembly.
Career in state politics In the
2006 Rhineland-Palatinate state election, Spiegel was the Greens candidate in the constituency of Ludwigshafen am Rhein II, and No. 7 on the party list. The party fell short of the 5%
electoral threshold and failed to win any seats. In the 2011 state election, Spiegel was the Greens candidate in the constituency of Speyer. She won 17.1% of votes, placing third behind the
CDU and
SPD candidates. She was third on the party list and was comfortably elected as one of the 18 Greens deputies, becoming deputy leader of the party's parliamentary group in the new Landtag. She served as spokesperson for women, integration, migration, and refugee policy. From 2014 to 2016, Spiegel also served on the Speyer city council. As one of the state's representatives at the
Bundesrat, Spiegel is a member of the Committee on Agricultural Policy and Consumer Protection, the Committee on the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, the Committee on Economic Affairs, and the Committee on Transport. She is also a member of the German–French Friendship Group set up by the
German Bundesrat and the
French Senate. As State Minister for Families, Spiegel continued the work of her predecessor Irene Alt in advocating for
marriage equality, campaigning for a vote in the Bundestag on the issue. In November 2016, she wrote a protest letter from the
Bundesrat to
Norbert Lammert, then
President of the Bundestag. The initiative undertaken by Spiegel led to the introduction and passage of the
Act introducing the right of marriage to persons of the same sex in June 2017. Spiegel became the first minister in Rhineland-Palatinate to take maternity leave, which she did in April 2018 to give birth to her fourth child. Spiegel brought the baby to a meeting of the Federal Council in October 2018. In November 2018, Spiegel represented the German federal government at the Women MPs Conference on the subject of "100 years of women's suffrage" in
London. There she also met then-
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Theresa May. At the meeting, Spiegel urged her to prevent
Brexit. In the
2021 state elections, Spiegel was nominated as lead candidate for the Greens. The party won 9.3% of votes in the election, becoming the third-largest in the Landtag. The coalition government between the
SPD, Greens, and
FDP was subsequently renewed, and Spiegel became Deputy Minister-President and Minister for Climate Protection, Environment, Mobility, Energy and Forests.
Career in federal politics In the negotiations to form a so-called
traffic light coalition of the
Social Democratic Party (SPD), the Green Party and the
Free Democratic Party (FDP) following the
2021 federal elections, Spiegel was part of her party's delegation in the working group on climate protection and energy policy, co-chaired by
Matthias Miersch,
Oliver Krischer and
Lukas Köhler. On 25 November 2021, she was nominated by the federal board of the Greens as Federal Minister for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth in the
Scholz cabinet. She took office on 8 December. Spiegel was nominated by her party as delegate to the
Federal Convention for the purpose of electing the
President of Germany in
2022. During the
flood in Rhineland-Palatinate in 2021, Spiegel was state environment minister. Shortly after the disaster, she was on a four week vacation in France. Spiegel had (falsely) stated that she had attended several cabinet meetings in Rhineland-Palatinate during her vacation. Up from March 2022, Spiegel was heavily criticized because internal documents revealed that she was more concerned with making her ministry look good than with assuming responsibility for the disaster. Spiegel resigned from her post on 11 April 2022. She stated: "Due to political pressure, I decided today to make the office of Federal Minister for Family Affairs available. I am doing this to avert damage to the office, which is facing major political challenges." She made no reference to her alleged mistakes in the statement. The nomination marks Spiegel’s first return to public office since her 2022 resignation. Local media described the move as a cautious political comeback, while some commentators questioned the choice. ==Other activities==